Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

In its short history the Etihad Stadium, the home of the current Premier League champions Manchester City, has witness despondency and glory in almost equal measure, but perhaps its more defining moments have come in the last ten years, late goals which have described a generation. A single moment in which a crowd hero made his mark for eternity deep into stoppage time and left a commentator breathless, a television hanging on the end of an extended vowel that still raises the hairs on the back of the neck and sends a shiver down the spine of anyone fortunate to have witnessed it take place.

It is the sound of the heavens cracking open and the fanfare of the ancients to which such moments are captured, seared into the memory that remains as thousands of Metallica Fans may have felt seeping into their conscious thought as they entered into the once known Eastlands and took in the show that arguably resonated more than most in the U.K.

Perhaps in the fields of The Ecstasy Of Gold, what was hardwired into the minds was how one of the Godfathers of the genre, and arguably one of the biggest bands to ever step foot on a stage would wow a Manchester crowd with the oncoming elements against them and the expectation of power flowing through the open air of a stadium. Roofless maybe but never toothless, and for Metallica the rain that poured down during the set only added to the sense of the majestic, the drama, the thrill, and in one clear shot caught by the cameras and ever appreciative eyes, Lars pounding the drums hard enough to shake the water back heavenwards was astounding.

It could have been different, the news that broke the night before about Dave Mustaine and his battle against throat cancer might have subdued the evening, nobody would have blamed the foursome had it done so, and despite disagreements over the years and the focus on the rivalry between Metallica and Megadeth, it was with surely a smile on the faces of all in the crowd that Megadeth were played between Ghost and the arrival of the main act on stage, and also in the alluding to during the gig itself.

It was a night that promised much and delivered all, a set that ranked with the very best, energetic, pulsing with magic, a showdown into which might never been captured again in British soil and as songs such as Disposable Heroes, The Gold That Failed, Here Comes Revenge, Sad But True, the mind blowing One, Master of Puppets, Creeping Death and the surprising sojourn of Kirk Hammett and Rob Trujillo performing The Stone Roses track I Wanna Be Adored took hold of the crowd’s hearts and squeezed them so hard that they would have burst in an exclamation of pleasure and no regrets.

Countless players have come out of the tunnel at The Etihad, all with their own skills, each wearing a colour in which their allegiance was sworn, but for the thousands who came to Manchester City’s ground for a midweek gig, it was the appearance of the Men in Black that drew the intake of breathe and left all knowing they had witnessed a moment that rivalled any for the boys in Blue in recent times.

Outstanding and brutally cool, Metallica at their finest.

Ian D. Hall